Sunday, March 20, 2016

Apparently the NRA is choosing our Supreme Court justices these days.

Supreme Court justices are nominated by the president and appointed with the advice and consent of the National Rifle Association, according to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY).

McConnell offered this unusual view of the confirmation process during an interview with Fox News Sunday. In response to a question from host Chris Wallace, who asked if Senate Republicans would consider the nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court after the election if Hillary Clinton prevails, McConnell responded that he “can’t imagine that a Republican majority in the United States Senate would want to confirm, in a lame duck session, a nominee opposed by the National Rifle Association [and] the National Federation of Independent Businesses.”

So now lobbyists have a say in who we choose to place on the highest court in the land?

Pretty much puts to rest their argument about letting "the people" decide. I guess they didn't explain that they weren't talking about actual people but only those "citizens united" faux people.

What bothers me most is not that the GOP is saying and doing this stuff. It's that the voters are allowing them to and supporting them in it. Despite all this, dumb fucks still vote these fascists into office.

I guess it's proof positive that there is no God, otherwise he would strike these guys down.

Well, I've always suspected that 'ole Mitch was sucking somebody's dick. Now I know the NRA is one of those. I believe it was Cicero who said that politicians weren't born, they were excreted. There are damn few public servants walking the halls of the Senate today and McConnell sure as hell isn't one of them.GeorgiaPeach

...Which brings us back to Donald Trump. No one would mistake Mr. Trump for eloquent, but he is a highly effective communicator in a political culture that is now almost indistinguishable from the reality TV culture from which he emerged. But the Trump phenomenon isn’t just about coarsening and stupidity: His political practices are precisely what the founders feared and Lincoln warned against.

When he was asked by CNN’s Jake Tapper about the sucker-punching episode, Mr. Trump responded by saying, “People come with tremendous passion and love for this country, and when they see protest — in some cases — you know, you’re mentioning one case, which I haven’t seen, I heard about it, which I don’t like. But when they see what’s going on in this country, they have anger that’s unbelievable. They have anger. They love this country.” In many respects, he added, “it’s a beautiful thing.”

This is an increasingly familiar refrain. When two brothers beat up a homeless Latino man last summer and cited Mr. Trump’s words as their justification — “Donald Trump was right, all these illegals need to be deported,” one of the men reportedly told the police — Mr. Trump responded by saying that while this was a shame, “I will say that people who are following me are very passionate.” His supporters, he said, “love this country and they want this country to be great again — they are passionate.”

Note Mr. Trump’s linkage of violence, passion, anger and love of country. After the sucker-punch, Mr. Trump, while himself protesting that he doesn’t condone violence, initially indicated that he might subsidize it. He said that he hoped that he hadn’t done anything to create a tone where violence was encouraged, even though he does just that. Last week, his campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, was accused of manhandling a reporter and then sought to discredit her on Twitter and elsewhere. Mr. Trump went out of his way to praise Mr. Lewandowski during his victory speech in Florida.

For Mr. Trump, this is all of a piece. His entire campaign, from its very first moments, has been built on stoking anger, grievances and resentment against people of other races, religions and nationalities. Mexicans coming to America are rapists and drug dealers. Muslims hate America and need to be barred from it. Syrian refugees are “Trojan horses.”

Not surprisingly, Mr. Trump’s politics of hate is now metastasizing into violence. He incites people — not all people to be sure, but enough. On social media in particular, one sees how he gives his supporters permission to express dark and ugly sentiments that existed before but were generally kept hidden from view.

...Trump enacts the Montaigne-esque model perfectly, and in these latest statements he follows (probably accidentally) two other models — one philosophical, the other literary. The philosophical model is provided by John Searle’s analysis of what he calls “indirect speech acts.” An indirect speech act is one that conveys more than its literal meaning. “Did you call my mother today?” is, on one level, a simple question and a request for information. But one can easily imagine the domestic situation in which the question is heard (indirectly) as a reminder of an obligation and as a potential rebuke. “You said you’d call my mother today and if you didn’t I’ll be really pissed off.” Another example: you ask, “Do you really want to eat the sixth piece of pizza?,” but you mean — and are heard as meaning — “You shouldn’t eat that sixth piece of pizza; it will be bad for you.”

So when Trump says, “I think you’d have riots,” he can claim (and does claim) that he is merely making a prediction, but his target audiences — his detractors and his supporters — will hear the prediction as a threat and an invitation respectively. To the one group he is saying, “This is what will happen to you if you gang up against me; the party will be ruined.” To the other group he is saying, “If they do this to me, you know what to do in response.” The fact that he specifically disclaims these message by declaring “I wouldn’t lead it” only calls attention to them. It is the “clean hands” gesture performed by someone whose hands are getting dirtier by the minute.

...Of course, the real reason for the McConnell-Grassley position has nothing at all to do with the fact that the nomination comes in the final year of President Obama’s term. It is inconceivable, for example, that they would take this position in the final year of, say, President Mitt Romney’s term of office. What we are dealing with here is rank hypocrisy.

The real reason for the intransigence of the Senate Republicans is that if Judge Garland were to succeed Justice Antonin Scalia on the Court, his appointment would move the Court in a more liberal direction. It would move the Court more or less back to the place it was at ten years ago, before the appointment of the very conservative Samuel Alito moved the Court appreciably to the right and enabled it either to eviscerate or to overrule many of the decisions on which the more moderate Justice O’Connor had previously leaned left.

It is perfectly understandable that Senate Republicans want the Supreme Court to mirror their views and do their bidding. But that is not a constitutionally legitimate reason for the Senate to refuse to confirm a well-qualified and reasonably moderate nominee. Indeed, it is noteworthy that of the sixteen Supreme Court justices who have been confirmed since 1967, eight of them substantially altered the ideological balance on the Court.

...Now, for the first time since 1967, a nominee put forward by a Democratic president might actually move the Court in an appreciably more liberal direction, and what happens - the Senate Republicans have a conniption! To make matters even worse, the nominee is only moderately liberal. The shift in the Court is due not to the judicial philosophy of Merrick Garland, but to the fact that he would replace one of the most rigidly conservative Justices in Supreme Court history.

McConnell, Grassley, and their cronies may not like the hand they have been dealt, but it is not their business to disregard well-established tradition. The plain and simple fact is that Merrick Garland is a well-qualified and reasonably moderate nominee. There is no principled or legitimate justification for refusing to consider — or to confirm — his nomination.

It is time for the Senate Republicans to back off and to act like responsible grownups who recognize that they have a solemn obligation to act according to the rule of law. If they don’t like that, then perhaps they should just resign their positions and let the nation get on with its business. If they move forward with their cynical and hypocritical plan, they will be guilty of a coup d’état of epic proportions.

Indicted ChargeAmended ChargeDV Related?ModifiersStage Date 03/19/16--------------------These are additional fields of information that can be filled out by the charging officer or DA if they pertain to a criminal charge. None of these would be filled out in the case of a simple non-criminal traffic offense. They are just a standard part of the Alaska Court View page and are not always filled out on each particular case even in criminal cases.

Indicted charge indicates that a person has been indicted in front of a grand jury.

An amended charge indicates the DA has requested to amend the original indicted charge.

DV Related? Domestic Violence related yes/no, also relates only to criminal indictments not traffic violations.For example, in Track's pending case on Court View the "DV Related" field is marked "Yes"

Modifiers refers to criminal cases as well and is where descriptors such as "aggravated" would be listed.

Stage date is the date the information was entered into the official court record.

When someone drives the 1/2 mile down my driveway and shows up uninvited to my door, after passing 2 private property, 3 no trespassing and 2 no soliciting signs, and try to shove some religion down my throat, I greet them at the door with my shotgun tucked under my arm and politely ask them to go the fuck away and for fuck's sake don't ever fucking come back, oh, and tell all your nut bag friends to stay away too!

What's amazing is you folks seem so surprised by this. What the hell did you think was going on for the last 35 years. Did you think all that talk about the NRA having to much power over our legislators was BS?

Poor Yertle, needs some lubricant to get his head back in that damn shell. Where, in the constitution, does it say "the Senate can delay consideration when the President is in his last term and happens to be a black democrat"?? POTUS should call them all back from break, lock them in a room until they come up with one reason not to confirm this nomninee.

You seem to be the one trying to take over here 6:22 & 6:29 I suspect you are the one who tries to do this often on this site. Please stop if you do not like the way this blog thread is. please go start you own Blogspot and quit trying to change this one to fit your requirements!

O/T - https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/here-comes-the-opposition-book-clinton-and-her-allies-prepare-for-trump/2016/03/20/0fc0fb04-ed51-11e5-b0fd-073d5930a7b7_story.html Clinton turns to general election play book and prepares to run against Trump.

Republicans Reeling As American People Demand SCOTUS Nominee Confirmation In New Poll

.... A new Gallup poll released today shows that 52% favor a Senate confirmation of Judge Merrick Garland and just 29% oppose it. (19% had no opinion, which is on par with previous polls on other nominees.)

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